Riverbank Unified trustees table administrative raises again

Riverbank Unified School District trustees again put off deciding on significant raises and new titles for two top administrators and an administrative secretary.

The board decided to table the issue at its Tuesday meeting. The board also declined to vote on the issue at its June 18 meeting after heavy community and union criticism. The district has not settled contract negotiations with employee unions for this school year.

“I expect the item to be brought back to the board at a future meeting,” Superintendent Daryl Camp said Wednesday.

Under the proposal, the head of business services and head of human resources would assume the positions of chief business officer and senior director of human resources, each with a 21 percent raise and the added requirement of having a bachelor’s degree. The superintendent’s secretary would become the executive assistant to the superintendent, with a 15 percent pay bump.

Existing employees doing the work now are the only ones being considered for the more robust jobs, with no plans to refill the lower positions, Camp said.

He provided the survey on which the salary boosts were based, showing Riverbank salaries for the top administrators are the lowest or second-lowest of those doing similar jobs in nearby districts of similar size, as well as the larger districts of Oakdale, Patterson and Sylvan.

Camp also noted that even the lowest-paid elementary school assistant principals in Riverbank make more than the department heads who approve their hiring and cut their checks. Even with the proposed bump, the two positions would sit about even at starting pay with those entry-level administrators, and at top pay roughly even with what a middle school principal could make. High school leaders would continue to have higher pay at every step on the provided salary schedules.

The director of business in Riverbank does the job of a chief business official, a position Riverbank trustees eliminated in 2009 as part of recession-era cuts. “The director of business, by default, became the primary fiscal administrator for the district,” notes an administration presentation on the proposal.

That downsizing has come at a price, the district notes. During the 2012-13 school year, it had to pinch-hit with a substitute fiscal manager, paying $110 an hour or nearly $200,000 on an annual basis.

The presentation says attracting and keeping quality staff was the second-highest priority for the board and sixth-highest for the community during spending input sessions. The proposed higher status and salaries are the district’s recommendation to make that happen.

Here are the numbers: The base salary for Riverbank’s top fiscal job and HR jobs is $66,247 at the bottom rung, rising to $84,549, plus 10 percent if the employee has a master’s degree, plus up to $5,000 for longevity.

That compares with a maximum base salary of $93,250, no extra for a higher degree, for the head of business and food services in the Newman-Crows Landing Unified School District, the closest in size to Riverbank. The Hughson Unified School District, a smaller district, pays the most in the survey, $155,542 in top base pay, for its chief business officer position. The median base salary of the districts was a range of $105,830 to $121,869.

The survey of other heads of human resources shows a very wide range, spreading from $65,528 at top pay for the Stanislaus Union School District’s post, called district coordinator, to Hughson’s assistant superintendent of HR position, with a base pay of up to $141,621. Riverbank’s top base pay of $84,549, plus 10 percent for a master’s degree, compares with a median of $100,553 to $115,459 for personnel chiefs in other districts surveyed.

Riverbank is proposing its CBO and senior director of human resources be paid less than the median in both cases, $80,158 to $102,305 as the range of base salary, plus the extras for education and longevity.

The secretarial job is called executive or administrative assistant in all the districts surveyed, ranging from a base pay of $52,125 in Riverbank to $70,054 in Hughson. The median was $63,517 for maximum base pay.

This story was originally published August 9, 2015 at 5:41 PM with the headline "Riverbank Unified trustees table administrative raises again."